Two short poems from VERBO MADRE
Listen: there’s a tiny hand
You spill,
end of delight,
a translucent initial in my pelvis,
I don’t know what message,
what grain of salt,
what watery code found between your temples.
And my womb is sweet,
and is an expanding star.
And everything feels me: I have a convex aura.
There is some, something, someone, like a rumor that emerges,
and its heart beats the texture of rattle,
and it travels, drunken nest, through my liquid core.
Listen: there is a tiny hand: it is writing
the opening line of its tale.
Escucha: hay una mano diminuta
Derramas,
final de la delicia,
una inicial translúcida en mi pelvis,
yo no sé qué mensaje,
qué gránulo de sal,
qué código del agua hallada entre tus sienes.
Y mi matriz es dulce
y es un astro expansivo.
Y todo me percibe: tengo un aura convexa.
Hay algo, alguno, alguien, como un rumor que emerge,
y su latido tiene la textura del crótalo,
y viaja, nido ebrio, por mi líquida entraña.
Escucha: hay una mano diminuta: está escribiendo
ese signo inicial de su relato.
In your clay mouth
Your mouth is that pool where the angel
dips her sweet fingers.
Creature who rules
the trance of my arms,
I look at you and my heart becomes
two lunar pitchers,
two liquid pastures
of dazzling cotton.
Love,
within your mouth soft as clay,
my breasts go on snowing
like a frozen landscape.
En tu boca de greda
Tu boca es esa poza donde el ángel
hunde sus dedos dulces.
Criatura que regentas
el trance de mis brazos,
yo te miro y el corazón se torna
dos cántaros lunares,
dos pastizales líquidos
de algodón deslumbrante.
Amor,
entre tu boca de blandura de greda
van nevando mis pechos
como un paraje helado.
Translator’s Statement
I brought Ana Instarú’s VERBO MADRE home with me from Costa Rica in the late 90s, but didn’t set out to begin translating poems from it until more recently. I was delighted that a book I first admired for its frank tone and joyful sexuality deepened for me after my own experiences of maternity and marriage. The poems in the collection explore pregnancy, birth, motherhood, and loss, are stunning and frank, erotic and tender. I’ve worked hard to maintain the strangeness and surprise of her imagery and syntax, and not to shy away from the unique combination of eroticism and maternity she celebrates. Of the work, Istarú says: “my goal…is to talk about motherhood from the point of view of its physical process, which traditional literature avoids or ignores. I wanted to recover all that animality, beastliness and physical strength and courage that motherhood implies, including sensuality. Sexuality. It is my way of combating the asexual and idealized image that patriarchy and religious tradition impose.”
Ana Istarú is a playwright, poet, opinion columnist, and award-winning actress. Her poetic works, including six collections of poems, have been included in multiple American and European anthologies and have also been translated into German, Italian, Dutch, Swedish, and Albanian. As a playwright, she has won two international awards, and her plays have been staged in Latin America, North America, Spain, Portugal and France.
Amanda Moore’s debut collection of poetry, Requeening (Ecco Press 2021), was selected for the National Poetry Series by Ocean Vuong. Her poems and essays have appeared in journals and anthologies including Best New Poets, ZZYZVA, Kenyon Review, and Ploughshares.
